Check out this story....

[JonesingForSpeed]

So I blew my motor at 34k miles on a stage 2 pro-tune by HB speed.  All that happened was the car had a small misfire during idle but still drove perfect. I thought it might have been a bad coil, so I replaced them but it still had the same problem. I then did a compression check (I already suspected this after reading all the Subaru Forums) I found that cyl 4 had half the compression it needed to have. The next day I drove it toSubaru, dropped it off.   

Cyl 4 ringland failure...
Replaced with new shortblock
Covered under warranty

2 Weeks Later:
I picked up the car, I immediately installed the stage 1 tune.
Babied it for 1000 miles and broke it in well (for the 1st time in my life I actually broke a car in nicely all the way through)
at 1700 miles, I put my Exhaust back on and went stage 2 (just the Cobb tune)
I gave 3 of my friends a ride around the block (not in a row, this was in the course of 1 week)(I didnt do anything crazy, I only went through the gears, no launching, nothing bad)
36,000 miles, and immediately after I gave my last friend a quick ride, motor started idling bad, at this point, I already knew...
I just couldnt believe this was happening...
Did a compression check, cyl 2 was at 68psi
Took it back to stock and brought it to the dealership.
They said they would cover it under warranty.
after taking everything apart, they said cyl 2 ringland failed....
2 weeks later, the day I was supposed to pick up my car, subaru called and said
"we found your youtube videos and we are not covering this under warranty, its going to cost $6000 if you want us to fix it"  I said  "haha yeah right, Im not paying $6000 for a motor thats just going to blow up in 2000 miles, Ill be there to pick up my car tomorrow with AAA and a pickup truck for the motor and all the parts.

I guess $6,000 is the going rate now days for a time bomb...

video that busted me: YouTube - Ken Jones - 07 Subaru Impreza WRX STI - El Mirage
(this video is old by the way...nothing to do with he recent motor build...)
how did they find my video??  good question...
I had a small sticker on my car with my company logo...I didnt think Subaru of Santa Monica would sink so low as to go searching online for a reason to not pay for my motor.  But I was wrong....

Im not gonna lie, I was pretty depressed...but after thinking about it, It was actually good this happened.  If not, I would have had 2k more miles on my car and another blown motor. 

The next day, I picked up my STI from Subaru with a flat bed AAA truck and a Ford F150 and placed all the engine components in the bed.  It took the entire bed and some of the cab...
I took the car to HB Speed - Fountain Valley and they said they would rebuild and reassemble the motor AND put some forged pistons etc in it.
1/3 the cost and 100,000 times the life, it was a very hard choice (sarcasm), but I chose HB Speed.
Remember guys, there are 5 problem areas in 07+ STIs.  I kinda knew this in the past, I just didnt know how bad it was...
(Bad Tune, Weak Pistons, Weak Rings, Weak Fuel Pump and Weak Oil Pickup) That being said:
__________________________________________________________________
Here is the new mod list:
Cosworth Pistons
Cosworth Rings
Eagle H-Beam Rods
Walbro 255LPH Fuel Pump
Prodrive 3 Port Boost Solenoid
KillerB Oil Pickup
Cobb Legacy 70mm SF Intake w/ Airbox 
Cobb AP V2
Invidia V3 Divorced Wastegate Catted Downipe
Invidia G200 Catback
Kartboy Exhaust Hangers
Invidia Up-Pipe w/ bung
Kartboy Engine Pitch Stopper
Kartboy License Plate Delete Kit (this added so much power!)

Suspension:
Epic Engineering Springs
Cobb 25mm Swaybars (front and back)
Kartboy Solid Endlinks
__________________________________________________________________

Nothing here really adds much power,  the builds purpose was to eliminate all future problems and allow me to run practically any turbo I want in the future.  That being said, I went and picked up my car and i had 2 tunes put in.  A super safe tune 288whp/308wtq and a semi-safe 324whp/347tq and RELIABLE......

Only thing keeping me from making more power is my stock turbo.  So pretty soon I want to pick up either the HTA Green or the Dominator 2.5XT-R, still debating...  Whatever happens I want to run a top mount intercooler so I dont wanna go too big of a turbo.  I like the mid-range road racing turbos anyway, kinda keeps the theme of our cars.

So...lesson for the year guys, FUCK DEALERSHIPS!!!!!!!!!!!
I hope you enjoyed my story, take care
Ken Jones

[StuSSYsporT]

damn ken... sucks about the motor blowing.  but nowadays.. like u said, fuck dealerships, especially around socal area.  it just seems like they dont know what they are doing, or just trying to fuck you over.

Hopefully your work done at HBspeed is a good experience.  Every shop has their good and bad stories so just make sure you look out for yourself, document everything, pictures... etc.

congrats on the motor build tho.... wish i could do that (without the blown motors and such... lol)

[ansonowicz]

I've heard many Subaru Dealerships are really trolling the web before providing warranty service.  In some eyes it can be petty, but at the same time they have probably had the wool pulled over their eyes.

I DO have good experiences with HB, but typically they are very busy and things take a litte longer if I happen to catch them during a Time attack project, etc.  However, i have yet to have any personal gripes or complaints against them.  Those guys always do right with me.


I know what you mean by having a GOOD build.  It's not necessarily power or modding, but the ability to give it a good beating knowing it'll still make it home.  My motor build (sorry I think I asked for a quote from your guy a while back and never got back to you guys; an F4 member rebuilt it for me at a VERY discounted price)  and supporting mods don't provide any huge numbers, but I basically asked him to tune it for high loads.

ie:  i want to bounce off the revs all day long going up a steep sand dune

[JonesingForSpeed]

yeah, HB Speed did alright, I have a few things I wasn't too happy with, mostly communications and finding parts on my invoice I wansnt ever told about (Eagle H-Beam Rods).  Few other things, but whatever, I was just glad my car wasnt broken anymore.  Will I ever go back?  Good question, we'll see...

In the end, Im happy with how things turned out I suppose.  Only thing Im not too fond of with the final result is that my car sounds like diesel.  Damn forged piston slap... hot or cold, that shit doesnt go away.  If I didnt know what it was, and I heard someones car doing that, I would be like "dude, your car is broken..."

But yeah guys, Jonesing For Speed now has a dealer 3 raiting which is the highest. I've been bumped up a ton of times in dealer ranking cus of my sales the last year and a half.   So if you guys need anything, let me know even if you dont see it on my store just email me a list.  I am sure I can help you guys out a lot.

Anson, the offer of you selling parts for me still stands,  my system is much much easier (referral system) no building your own store or having to deal with any of that tedious stuff.  Basically JFS is everyones part time job, and the system works really well like this.  So if youre still up to it, I can go more into depth about everything, let me know when youre ready.